About us

Greentraveller is a film production agency that specialises in producing storytelling videos using aerial (we are licensed by the Civil Aviation Authority to fly drones commercially), animation and interactive technology, and also produce online visitor guides, print publications and promotions alongside our video production.

We work with a range of clients worldwide in the public and private sector, including transport operators, local government, protected landscapes, DMOs, national tourist boards, charities, national and international conservation organisations.

We also manage the well-known consumer website greentraveller.co.uk, which is a platform for our award-winning blog and Greentraveller's Guides to Destinations (see Media Pack) - written, researched and produced by our team of professional travel writers, photographers and videographers, the guides contain fresh, original content about local accommodation, food & drink, visitor attractions, heritage, craft & culture, towns & villages, flora & fauna, low impact activities, including walks and cycle rides.

Greentraveller was shortlisted in the British Travel Press Awards, which recognise excellence in travel writing, photography and broadcasting, Our blog has been included in Expedia's Top 30 Blogs and greentraveller.co.uk was featured in The Independent's 'The 50 Best Travel Websites', June 2017.

Sarah Baxter

ContributorEver since her Grandad took her on childhood rambles across the Norfolk countryside, Sarah has loved getting out into the great outdoors. Fortunately, she's managed to turn this love into a living. In 2002 she joined Wanderlust magazine, the bible for independent-minded travellers, and has since written extensively about travel and adventure for a range of other publications, from The Telegraph and The Independent to Country Walking, Lonely Planet and Runners World. She's also written a book, The History of the World in 500 Walks.

She loves global travel, but has an inkling that the UK might just be the world's best destination. Whether she's floating down Welsh rivers, hiking around the Cornish coast, topping tors in Dartmoor, bird-watching in Norfolk, spotting stags in the Cairngorms or strolling straight into the Cotswolds from her Bath front door, she's happiest when exploring at home.

Richard Hammond

Richard is the founder and Executive Producer of Greentraveller. He has produced over 100 videos for a range of clients in both the public and private sectors. Richard was previously the Guardian's eco travel correspondent and has been involved in travel media for over 20 years, commenting in the press and on radio regarding sustainable transport and tourism. Richard is currently a judge of the Innovation Category of the The World Travel & Tourism Council's Tourism for Tomorrow Awards. He lives on the outskirts of Bath on the border with the Cotswolds Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, a short bike ride from the Great Western railway line.

Creative Director of PhotographyChris has been a professional photographer for over 25 years working on TV and film, NGO, editorial and corporate assignments in over 50 countries. He has worked for a range of presitgious travel and tourism clients, including BBC Worldwide, British Airways, Condé Nast, The Branson Centre of Entrepreneurship, Thomas Cook, TUI, The Travel Foundation, and The Nature Conservancy.

Holly Rooke

Writer and Video EditorHolly works on content for Greentraveller, including writing, video editing and social media. She has a first-class degree in English Literature and Philosophy from The University of Bristol.

Nigel Camp

VideographerNigel has produced over 100 videos for a variety of companies and organisations, such as Johnson & Johnson, the Holiday Inn and BritMums. He has enormous experience in filming everyone from juniors to CEOs of large corporates. Nigel is the author of The Video Effect, a book that teaches brands and businesses how to use video to market themselves effectively. He is a keynote speaker and digital tutor at the General Assembly. Nigel also blogs on useful tips on video making at thevideoeffect.tv.

Alex Cantouris

VideographerAlex has produced over 25 high quality online videos for us, most recently using the 4K Lumex Panasonic handheld camera. Alex has also produced videos for corporates, the music industry and short films, and has had films screened at TOFF - The Online Film Festival; On Location Memphis Shorts Film Festival; MIA Film Festival; International Euro Film Festival Online; Making Waves Film Festival.

George Chan

VideographerGeoge spent 11 years with the BBC Natural History Unit filming all over the world on landmark series including Wild China and Planet Earth. He recently completed a conservation film about Richmond Park in London with Sir David Attenborough which won the gold award at the EVCOM film awards.

Tina Smith

ContributorTina Smith is an award winning designer and art director with 10 years experience in journalism. She has worked on a diverse range of titles, from whizzy digital editions of Empire to hand-stiched headlines of Pretty Nostalgic, via a string of wide-ranging BBC publications and many others. Nature and the great outdoors are the subjects closest to her heart, leading her to co-found Lost in London magazine in 2010, and subsequently co-author a book of the same name.

Paul Bloomfield

ContributorPaul has been writing about and photographing travel, food, drink, music and the wonders of Britain for over 10 years. He's written for Lonely Planet, Wanderlust and numerous other magazines, newspapers and websites, in that time tackling the Zambezi by raft, the Hudson by kayak, and the Swedish Arctic on a husky sled. Mostly, though, he prefers riding Shank's pony, hiking trails from Cornwall to New Zealand's Queen Charlotte Track.

Ginny Light

Contributor Ginny combines a career in teaching geography with writing academic and travel articles, which keeps her busy in the holidays but best of all impresses her students. Ginny started her writing career at Business Traveller magazine, during which she was awarded Young Travel Writer of the Year by travel news weekly, Travel Trade Gazette. She then took over editorship of the industry news website Travelmole and later joined The Times where she became Online Travel Editor and later Online Features Editor. Ginny has written frequently about adventure travel, green travel and places to stay and loves travelling in the UK, South-east Asia and North America. On her wish list is the Swedish coast, more of Scotland’s islands and Japan.

Florence Fortnam

Writer and Content ManagerFlorence writes and manages our Greentraveller's Guides and other content on Greentraveller.com. She joined Greentraveller in 2012 after five years as Italy and France editor at Alastair Sawday's.

Yvonne Gordon

ContributorYvonne’s work has been published in The Irish Times, The Irish Independent, The Irish Mail on Sunday, Metro, The Guardian, The National, Abroad magazine and Private Islands magazine. She also writes for travel guides such as DK Eyewitness and Explorer Publishing and she co-wrote DK Eyewitness Travel – Back Roads Ireland, an exploration of Ireland’s unexplored countryside (2010).

Harriet O'Brien

ContributorHarriet O’Brien is a journalist and editor who has been writing about travel and its myriad rewards for more than 15 years. Since she moved from downtown Brixton to rural Oxfordshire several years ago, she has developed a preference (bordering on dogged determination) to explore places on foot – it’s the only way to get really under the skin of a location, she says. She is the Cotswolds correspondent for The Telegraph and is a regular contributor to The Independent, among other media outlets.

ContributorBorn in Yorkshire, Rhiannon Batten grew up in Hong Kong, Germany and the Welsh borders, before studying archaeology and anthropology at Oxford University. After a stint on the travel desk of the Independent, during which time she was awarded Young Travel Writer of the Year, she moved to Scotland, where she was based for over a decade, before returning to London. Having written a book on sustainable travel in 2007, Higher Ground: How to Travel Responsibly Without Roughing It, she now writes on green travel, community tourism and nature tourism for a number of publications, including the Independent, the Guardian, ELLE magazine, Wanderlust and National Geographic Traveller.

Paul Miles

ContributorPaul has been writing and photographing on sustainable travel for over a decade. His work has appeared in many publications, including the Financial Times, Sunday Telegraph, Daily Telegraph, The Guardian, Condé Nast Traveller, BBC Wildlife, Geographical, The Ecologist and The Idler. Paul lives in the Midlands, cruising the waterways of England & Wales in his narrowboat using public transport and his bicycle.

Emma Smith

Emma is our finance manager, responsible for our accounts for all our advertisers, clients and freelancers.

Simon Wilson

ContributorSimon is a writer and editor for the UK's bestselling subscription magazine The Week. He also has a weekly investment column in the country's bestselling financial magazine Moneyweek. He combines this with another life as an actor on stage and television. He has worked at the National Theatre, Shakespeare's Globe and lots of other places, and has appeared in nearly every middlebrow TV crime drama you can think of. Earlier this year, Simon could be seen as a charming-but-slimy brain surgeon on EastEnders, doing intentionally poor dancing in a successful attempt to make Ronnie Mitchell smile.

Matt Witt

Non Exec DirectorMatt runs his own business providing operations analysis and advice, principally for e-commerce companies. He is also an active angel investor, supporting 5 different start-up ventures currently, and works as a director with several internet enterprises.

Between 2007-2010, Matthew served as Non-Executive Director of toptable, Europe’s largest online restaurant booking company processing approximately £130M of reservations per annum. Prior to this, Matthew had been Chief Operating Officer at Booking.com, formerly Active Hotels. He joined Active at its inception in March 2000, and as Operations Director, helped lead Active through its start-up phase to to becoming the number one European online hotel retailer in 2006, with responsibility for Sales, Marketing, Technology and Distribution. Following the merger with Bookings BV in 2005, he continued as COO for Active Hotels, overseeing the integration of the companies’ technical and management systems, and the creation of a single operating business, Booking.com.

Andrew Phillipps

ChairmanAndy is Entrepreneur in residence at INSEAD business school. Previously, Andy was Chairman of Toptable (2005-2010), the online restaurant reservations website, and the co-founder and CEO of Active Hotels (1999-2006), which he helped to grow to become the largest on-line hotel booking company in Europe. The company was recognised as the fastest growing technology company in the UK by Deloitte, was a Sunday Times best employer, and Andy won Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year.

Andy has subsequently helped found, expand and/or invest in a number of start-ups, including Reevoo (Europe’s leading provider of social commerce solutions. Reevoo has been deployed by more than 150 major brands including Sony, BestBuy and Dixons helping them to achieve average sales uplifts of 18% through boosted conversion rates and increased order values, turning browsers into shoppers) and I2O (the pressure management technology that helps water companies dramatically reduce water leakage and energy usage).

Here's a snapshot of some of the press coverage of greentraveller:

if you have a press enquiry, please email: info AT greentraveller.co.uk with subject line: PRESS ENQUIRY

If you wish to be sent a copy of our media pack, please email: sales AT greentraveller.co.uk with subject line: MEDIA PACK

23 October: The Guardian profiles greentraveller.co.uk in its top travel websites for rail, road and sea: "Another longstanding favourite for many eco-aware travellers, this site is packed with information for people who don't want to fly. It offers guides to travelling by public transport and train. There are plenty of listings for green accommodation and it's all well-organised. So if you want to stay in a treehouse in France and get there by rail, you can find all you need to know in a couple of clicks."

15 Septemer 2013: Greentraveller.co.uk is shortlisted for the Best Online Consumer Travel Publication in the British Travel Press Awards (along with Telegraph, Daily Mail, CNN & Wanderlust), as well as for the Travel Editors' Green Award (for the fifth year).

"Swap your travel agent""For a holiday with a minimal carbon footprint, greentraveller.co.uk can help. The site features hundreds of eco-friendly places to stay and inspiring holidays you can reach without flying. You'll find eco lodges in Morocco, green hotels in Spain and treehouses in Portugal, all reachable by train or foot passenger ferry services. Enjoy watersports, trekking, cycling or simply unwind and relax while your eco conscience takes a break, too."

7 June 2013: Greentraveller featured in the Independent's 50 Best Travel Websites:“If you’d rather not fly – whether you hate the experience or worry about your carbon footprint – Green Traveller is packed with holiday ideas,” says Mark. “There’s everything from yurt camps in the south of France to ski touring in Scotland, all of which you can reach by train, coach or ferry. The site is well-designed and written by expert journalists.”

8 February 2013: Greentraveller (along with the editor of the family section of ‘National Geographic Traveller’ and the author of Footprint’s ‘Travel with kids’) was asked by the Independent to recommend the 50 Best Spring Days Out.

27 January 2013: Greentraveller is featured in The Times 50 Best Travel Websites"Started as a blog by Richard Hammond — the eco-travel writer, not the TV presenter — Green Traveller offers holiday spots in the UK and Europe that can only be reached by bike, bus, train or ferry. Holidays are sourced from more than 40 tour operators. There are also tons of eco tips for cutting carbon emissions while on holiday and green guides to cities and attractions."

2012

9 December 2012: Eurostar partners with Greentraveller as part of its Tread Lightly initiative, along with Friends of the Earth, Start, The Ashden Awards, and the Sustainable Restaurant Association, which Eurostar says are "leading authorities in sustainability": Eurostar Partnerships

1 November 2012: Greentraveller is shortlisted, for the forth time, for the British Travel Press Awards.

Green Traveller offers a mixture of reviews, destination guides and holiday inspiration. It also has a handy travel planner that lets you tailor your travels to your interests, whether it be culture, adventure or cycling. Also worth checking out is the rail, bus and ferry finder widgets, which allow you to plan a flight-free journey without breaking a sweat.

"Green Traveller offers a mixture of reviews, destination guides and holiday inspiration. It also has a handy travel planner that lets you tailor your travels to your interests, whether it be culture, adventure or cycling. Also worth checking out is the rail, bus and ferry finder widgets, which allow you to plan a flight-free journey without breaking a sweat.

"Quirky accommodation ideas (tree house anyone?) plus easy to use widgets make it brilliant for anyone planning a holiday. Reviews are honest and big on environmental details."

20115 November: The Guardian publishes our Green Travel List, celebrating the 25 most innovative examples of green travel and tourism, see: The 2011 Green Travel List. The feature, written by Greentraveller's Richard Hammond, has been re-tweeted over 220 times and been recommended on facebook by over 280 readers.

27 October: Greentraveller celebrates its 5th birthday by reaching the landmark figure of over 500 green places to stay featured on the website and over 1,500 holidays reachable by train. Read more about the celebrations and our landmarks: Greentraveller celebrates its 5th birthday

18 October: Greentraveller has been shortlisted for the British Travel Press Editors' Green Award 2011, for the third year in a row

9 June: Greentraveller's Head of Marketing and Business Development, Holly Tuppen, presents the 'Green Traveller' Award to Nicholas Crane at the inaugural Green Tourism Awards, organised by the Green Tourism Business Scheme, hosted by environmentalist Tony Juniper.

1 May: The Independent features greentraveller in its list of the 50 Best Travel Websites: "Going stronger than ever since its redesign, this site packed with inspirational trips and reviews on green places to stay".

12 March: The Independent newspaper asked greentraveller to recommend 10 bed and breakfasts for its guide to the 50 Best B&Bs in the UK, which was published in the paper & online today.

18 February: greentraveller's chief executive and founder Richard Hammond is featured as an 'Eco Hero' on the influential green communications website Greenhouse.

10 February: National Geographic Traveller magazine features greentraveller as a "pioneering website". The full description is as follows: "Pioneering website www.greentraveller.co.uk now lists more than 200 eco-minded places to stay across 27 countries, from Scotland to Slovenia. And there's nothing 'hair-shirty' about these handpicked places, from luxury yurts in France to beautiful fincas in Spain, plus novel holidays like dolphin conservation in Greece and Alpine multi-activity breaks for families."

October: The Sunday Times names greentraveller.co.uk as one of five 'Best On The Net' and says greentraveller is "a site we should all be using more often. The journalist Richard Hammond’s web pages are the first place to look for green holidays and for discussions on environmental issues."

Greentraveller is working with the following organisations to promote sustainable transport and tourism:

National Parks UKThe UK's National Parks are home to some of the most beautiful and diverse landscapes in Britain. Guided by the Sandford principle, the National Parks work to conserve and enhance the natural beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage within their individual regions. In addition to this, the UK's National Parks family works to promote opportunities for the understanding and enjoyment of the special qualities of National Parks by the public. The 15 members of the National Parks family are: Brecon Beacons, Cairngorms, Dartmoor, Exmoor, Lake District, Loch Lomond & the Trossachs, New Forest, Northumberland, North York Moors, Peak District, Pembrokeshire Coast, Snowdonia, South Downs, Yorkshire Dales. To learn more about National Parks, what they do and how you can enjoy them, visit the UK National Parks website: nationalparks.gov.uk

Landmark TrustThe Landmark Trust is a charity that rescues important buildings that would otherwise be lost. It takes on historic places in danger and carefully and sensitively restore them. By making them available for holidays, they make sure they can be enjoyed by all, both today and for future generations. The Landmark Trust is working with Greentraveller to promote a selection of its properties to Greentraveller's audience.

VisitEnglandVisitEngland is England's national tourist board. Its role is to grow the value of tourism by working in partnership with the industry to deliver inspirational marketing campaigns and to provide advocacy for the industry and visitors. The organisation’s work is underpinned by robust research and customer insights. Greentraveller has produced a series of map leaflets with Visit England: Green London and Green Brighton Guide. Since these were published, VisitEngland invited Greentraveller to speak at its Destination Management Forum on the Untapped market session covering 'Green Tourism'.

VisitWalesVisitWales is the tourism team within the Welsh Assembly Government's Department for Heritage. Visit Wales has taken over the functions of the former Wales Tourist Board (WTB), with responsibility for the promotion and development of tourism in Wales. Its mission is to "maximise tourism's contribution to the economic, social and cultural prosperity of Wales" and to deliver the Welsh Assembly Government’s Tourism strategy. VisitWales has commissioned Greentraveller to produce a series of videos promoting sustainable transport and tourism at its Centres of Excellence.

Scottish Natural HeritageScottish Natural Heritage is funded by the Scottish Government. Its purpose is to:

VisitBritainVisitBritain is the national tourism agency, a nondepartmental public body, funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, responsible for promoting Britain worldwide and developing its visitor economy. Its mission is to grow the value of inbound tourism to Britain, working with a wide range of partners in both the UK and overseas. Through its global reach, it aims to increase visitor spend to all parts of Britain and improve Britain’s ranking in the eyes of international travellers. VisitBritain has commissioned Greentraveller's writers to produce a series of feature articles on local food and sustainable holidays.

The Long RunThe Long Run started in 2009 as an initiative of Zeitz Foundation’s international programme. It was launched by Jochen Zeitz, Founder of the Zeitz Foundation and Co-Chair with Sir Richard Branson of The B Team. The Long Run's vision is that of a world in which ‘Business, Nature and People are harmoniously working together for a sustainable future’. It seeks to "support, connect and inspire nature-based businesses to excel in following the highest standards of sustainability encompassing Conservation, Community, Culture and Commerce (4Cs) and collectively influencing others to take up best practices for a sustainable future worldwide". Greentraveller is an affiliate member of The Long Run.